A group of 21 of us responded to the call from Mary Duggan, Judi and Noel Sharp to gather at the Church Hall of St Michael's Church in Tetbury, on the evening of the 7th August, to explore what we could do locally to avert the climate crisis.
The call for local action came after the screening, at The Goods Shed, of the film "An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power" and the very engaging talk given by John Andrews "Talk: Global Warming". Sometimes the enormity of the climate crisis can leave us feeling powerless to help, or guilty for our part in it, or grieving for what is being lost or even wanting to deny it is happening at all. Whatever brought each of us to gather together that night didn't matter. What mattered was we all wanted do find ways to play our part in averting the climate crisis , especially what we could do locally.
The evening started with Noel asking us to reflect, in small groups, on the key messages we had each taken from the film and/or talk and capture these for sharing with the bigger group. Some of us had missed the film or talk, or both but we still managed to work together to share our worries, passion and hopes. And when we shared these as a bigger group there were obvious themes coming out which were captured by Judi as
energy
transport
food
communication (change)
We followed our energy to the group we were most interested in discussing further and much animated talking followed!
We ended the evening with a summary from each group and what immediate action could be taken and a commitment to meet again in September at Christ Church in Tetbury. These actions will be summarised in a separate blog soon.
As a newcomer to Tetbury I felt fully included by everyone and I valued hearing about how Tetbury has evolved over the years.
Thank you to all involved with making this happen and to the Tetbury Minimal Plastic group on Facebook for advertising the meeting.